“I guarantee he’s enjoying every second.” Pax winds my hair around his fist and brings a mirror in front of my eyes. “Look at him. He can’t get enough of that tight ass.”
I’m transfixed by the reflection of Liam, his bedroom eyes hooded, obscuring the guilt I know lives there. He flings his head back, lids fluttering shut as he drives his cock into me.
“Look at him,” Pax taunts. “He’s not so honorable now, is he?”
“He has more honor than you have in your pinky finger.” I grind out the insult through gritted teeth.
“That’s not honor. He’s getting off on your pain. Look how much he’s enjoying it.”
That’s where he’s wrong. Liam’s getting off because he held back for weeks, even while sleeping next to me every night, but now…
Now he can hold back no more, especially after I begged him to take me.
His harsh grip on my flesh eases, and I feel the gentle brush of his fingers at my hip—his way of issuing a silent apology. A quiet promise of a quick climax. I focus on that connection, on his fingers stroking my skin as he seats himself fully inside me.
“Ow!”
“I’m sorry,” he grunts.
“What a fucking waste,” Pax says, letting go of my hair. He sets the mirror aside and stands back to watch us, arms crossed over his massive chest. “The title of chancellor should go to someone with balls.”
“Someone like you?” Liam’s pace increases as he climbs to the tipping point. Leaning over my back, he grips my shoulders, grinding into me.
“At least I have big enough balls to fuck who I want when I want, without needing an excuse to do so. And people around here call me a monster.”
Stalling inside me, Liam answers with a gruff shout as he comes in a wave of pleasure that no amount of guilt can stop. After such a turbulent and climactic end, the dungeon’s keeper allows us a minute to acclimate.
Liam’s heavy breaths hit my nape as he slowly comes down from the high, and when he finally descends—when the dust settles and the consequences of our decisions come back to haunt us—I can’t help but wonder if this will be the thing that destroys us completely.
13
Aroused from the display of depravity in the dungeon, and hyped up on adrenaline and insanity, Pax screws Frieda all night, keeping me locked in the cage—a victim trapped in the shudder of iron bars each time she howls in pain.
Because he never changed out his piercings.
Despite his thirst for vengeance, in the end, she screams just as loudly from pleasure when he makes her come. By the time he frees me from my cage the following morning, I’m sleep-deprived and traumatized, my brain still trying to process the last twenty-four hours. I go through the motions like an obedient robot.
Get in the shower and wash my hair.
Eat some fruit and oatmeal.
Bear witness to him paddling Frieda’s ass in the great room.
That’s my fault too, because for reasons unknown, he chooses to unleash his anger on her instead of me.
As he leads me to the first floor by the leash, though this time I’m clothed in a taupe dress that falls mid-calf, I can barely believe I’m almost free of him. We halt in front of the library, and he removes my collar.
His calculating gray eyes lock on mine. “Let me give you some advice, my queen. Don’t end up in my dungeon.”
“I don’t intend to.”
“We’ll see,” he says, letting the threat dangle. His lips quirk in promise as he heads back the way he came, leaving me alone in the hall to start a new chapter in this twelve-month rollercoaster journey.
There’s no sense in delaying—not when I can finally breathe again. I enter the library with a mixture of relief and anxiousness, arming myself to face whatever awaits behind door number eight, because it couldn’t possibly be as bad as the House of Libra.
The room is awash with autumn sunlight, and Ford Stryker greets me with a boyish grin. He doesn’t look a day over eighteen. Despite most of the men in this tower having several years on me, they’re experienced beyond their age. Until now, Ford has always remained on the outskirts, unassuming and at odds with his flamboyant sign.
“We Scorpios do things a little differently,” he says, striding toward me. “It’s a long-standing tradition in my family to hold a ball on the night of the exchange.”
“A ball…like the one Landon hosted on his birthday?”
“Similar.” He hands me a black box outfitted in dark lace. “Take a look.”
Opening the lid, I discover two intricate masks—one black and one silver. “A masquerade ball?”
“Yes, and a night of freedom.”
“Freedom?”
“Freedom to be whoever you want to be, as long as no one touches your virginity, of course.”
“Of course,” I reply, my tone laden with sarcasm.